Residential School Survivors Air Grievances

Residential School Survivors Air Grievances

Wednesday, September 20, 2006 at 14:56

A judicial hearing into the proposed $1.9-billion residential school compensation settlement is into its third day.

A judge in Regina has been hearing from victims and lawyers.

The victims have been given the opportunity to air their objections to the proposed settlement package, but many of them used the opportunity to air their grievances about how the whole issue has been handled over the years — not necessarily the settlement package itself.

Lawyer Tony Merchant told the court this morning that there needs to be benchmarks established that would fix a firm timeframe on when residential school victims could expect to be compensated after making an application.

Meanwhile, the National Residential School Survivors’ Society held a meeting in Regina this morning to discuss how it could help make the compensation process move more quickly.

The chair of the group noted that an average of four residential school victims die each day.